Memorization Challenge: Day 1 of Philippians
Today is the day to start memorizing Philippians (why put it off?)! Don’t worry, I’m not going to post every day. But it seems that an introduction is in order.
So you may remember that the Apostle Paul had a vision of a man of Macedonia saying,“Come over to Macedonia and help us!” (Acts 16:9)
Well, Paul’s missionary team concluded that God wanted the Gospel preached there. So the team headed to what we now call Europe and ended up in the city of Philippi.
Philippi is in ruins today, but it was a very important city back around 50 AD/CE when Paul first visited. It had been settled by Romans and was in fact considered “Roman soil” outside of Rome itself. This meant that the Philippians didn’t have to pay taxes.
Philippi was in what we now call Greece, on a main trade route. In fact, you can still see the ruins (see map below).
Paul, Timothy, Silas, and Dr. Luke visited the city and first met up with some Jewish women outside of the city (perhaps Jewish by birth, but likely Gentile converts). You can read the story of this first visit to Philippi in Acts 16:9-40.
Paul would visit the city again on future mission trips. Finally, he wrote them this letter. The church at this time was probably about 10 years old, and Paul may not have visited for about 5 years.
Philippians was probably written around 61 AD/CE. The tradition says, and the evidence seems to suggest, that he wrote while he was in prison in Rome.
It seems that the letter was accepted very quickly, if not immediately, as authoritative Scripture. A student of the Apostle John named Polycarp wrote a letter to the same church early in the second century, referring to Paul’s earlier letter. The First Epistle of Clement, possibly written even earlier, to the church in Corinth, also alludes to Philippians. It seems this epistle was quickly copied and circulated.
So, with the goal of roughly 6 verses a week, we start today with verse 1:
Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus,
To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are at Philippi, with the overseers and deacons:
If you’d like to memorize with us, check this post for more information and how to dowload a booklet with tips on how to go about memorizing a book.